


5 things that caused Cracker and Brooke to break it off, and 1 thing that didn't

by she_who_dares



Series: Miz Crooke [1]
Category: RuPaul's Drag Race RPF
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Fluff, M/M, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-08
Updated: 2019-06-08
Packaged: 2020-04-12 16:12:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19135555
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/she_who_dares/pseuds/she_who_dares
Summary: After their first encounter, the two queens keep falling into each other, breaking it off, and finding their way back to each other again. This is how it went down.





	5 things that caused Cracker and Brooke to break it off, and 1 thing that didn't

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Saiph for beta reading and indulging my nonsense!  
> Veronica gets credit for making me laugh with the dog line.  
> I love a 5+1 fic and if anyone gives me any sort of encouragement, I'll end up writing more XD

 

  * _When they got caught out by Kameron_



 

  
  


A near-winded gasp for air was the sound that first got Kameron’s attention. 

  
  


“Oh… god...keep going,” said a familiar voice, a desperate, high-pitched whine threaded through the begging, accompanied by breathless panting that was the sign of someone  _ clearly _ being given a good time by  _ someone _ . Kameron, passing by his friend’s dressing room and spotting the slightly opened door, smirked a little as he approached, about to subtly close it before texting Brooke Lynn that she could thank him later. He was just about to wrap his hand around the doorknob before a second speaker became audible, stopping the eavesdropper in his tracks.

  
  


“Sssh, I’m repaying the favour, aren’t I? Be fuckin’ patient!” laughed the second man, whose voice was also familiar - so familiar, in fact, that Kameron could picture his face, the corners of his brown eyes wrinkled in laughter before he carried on doing…  _ oh. _ His own eyes widened, recognising that it was his Season 10 sister, apparently in some kind of encounter with his sister from Tennessee.  _ What the fuck? _

  
  


Hating himself for feeling like a voyeur but kind of dying to see what was happening, Kameron carefully leaned forward, looking through the gap. There, he could see that his assumptions were right - Cracker on his knees before Brooke Lynn. The former’s hands were holding back the latter’s skirts, dark head confidently bobbing up and down while the blonde’s head tilted back, lipsticked mouth hanging open as the moans began to build. Still confused as to how the fuck these two had ended up this way - especially as they’d clearly been so keen to get started that Brooke’s only move towards de-dragging was getting untucked - a mischievous moment came over their mutual friend with a look on his face to match. With one swift movement, Kameron shut the door loud enough to cause the two men inside to yelp in surprise before he made his escape, being a safe fifteen feet down the corridor and around a corner before pulling out his phone, including both queens’ numbers in a text.

  
  


_ “Don’t be too mad, bitches. Really. It could’ve been Eureka that caught you going at it.” _

  
  


  1. _When Bob couldn’t stop laughing_



  
  


“Hytes? Seriously, bitch?”

  
  


Cracker and his drag mother were hanging out at his own place in Harlem, back from the tour where he and his Canadian lover had already tried to break it off once. After Kameron had caught them - and wasted no time in letting them know about it - he and Brooke Lynn had lasted a grand total of a week before falling back into bed round about the time of their gig in Paris, where their night off in the clubs of Montmartre had apparently been quite the aprodiasiac. Even now that they were back in the US, and in whole different time zones, let alone states, things between them hadn’t exactly gone back to PG13. In fact, at this very moment, Cracker was sitting through Bob’s uproarious laughter with the knowledge that Brooke had been sending progressively more filthy text messages all afternoon, and he was wondering what the hell he was going to actually find once he had the chance to check his phone after Bob left.

  
  


“I mean, fuck, what is she? 6’1? 6’2? It must be like a pomeranian fucking a Great Dane!” the larger man cackled, laughter ringing off the walls in the small apartment. 

  
  


Cracker bristled slightly, raising an eyebrow as he looked at his friend. “6’3. And original, Bob, really fuckin’ original. I don’t seem to recall  _ you _ complaining about it when we were together.”

  
  


Bob, seeing the look on his daughter’s face, took a couple of breaths, still giggling a little before eventually settling. “Alright, alright, I’ll drop it. I mean, clearly you got a fucking type, or a  _ complex,  _ but I’ll drop it.” He paused, though, looking more serious this time.

  
  


“For real, though, whatever this -” he gestured between the two of them - “is with you guys, you’ve got to think fast about whether it’s worth it. Because if Michaels knows, and I know… who else does? How long’s it going to be before someone tells Vanjie?”

  
  


Cracker’s face fell.

  
  


_ “Oh, shit.” _

  
  
  


  1. _When Vanjie found out_



  
  


Telling Vanjie was not a fun time.

  
  


It wasn’t as bad as it could have been, Brooke Lynn supposed, but it was still not an experience he would ever care to repeat.

  
  


He’d called him when he was in LA, suggested meeting for coffee as they often did, but even on the phone, his ex had been able to tell something was up.

  
  


“How long?” he’d asked, his foghorn voice unusually soft. When told the truth - that it had started on the European tour Vanjie hadn’t gone on - he almost snorted with laughter at the same time as looking plaintively at the man across from him. “Think I knew, deep down, you were ready to move on. Didn’t think it’d be with someone I knew so well, though.”

  
  


Brooke attempted to protest a little, said that he and Cracker were hardly enough of a thing for them to be considered as ‘moving on’ together, but Vanjie merely raised an eyebrow at him as first response. “Don’t you pull that crap with me. I know you both too well for that.”

  
  


“What do you mean?”

  
  


“You both put up walls and shit. Tried to be public, got hurt, shut down and never told nobody how you felt ‘bout anything since. You both got people saying you got no feelings, but you sure do. Both got so many of ‘em that you don’t know what to  _ do _ with ‘em, so you act the ho and don’t show anybody what you really got going on. It’s hard for most folks to get that, when they try and give and don’t feel like they got anything back, but you two?” Vanjie shrugged before taking a sip of his coffee. “You two fuckers might actually understand each other.”

  
  


It was all Brooke could do to avoid freezing to the spot in panic.

  
  


_ “Oh shit.” _

  
  
  


  1. _When The Vixen told a few home truths_



  
  


If there was one thing anybody knew about The Vixen, it was that she didn’t pull any punches.

  
  


“Hytes? Are you fucking kidding?”

  
  


Cracker slid further down into her seat at the bar, visibly cringing at her friend’s vociferous response. “Raise your voice, why don’t you, bitch? There’s a few guys over by the restrooms who can’t hear you!”

  
  


“I don’t care!” The Vixen slammed her drink down on the bar, some of the clear liquid within sloshing out and over the sides. “Seriously, I didn’t have you pinned down as having such… such  _ bland _ tastes.”

  
  


“ _ Bland?” _ Cracker was clearly shocked, her mouth hanging open as she stared at her friend so hard that her eyes even bulged a little. “The hell? You’ve seen how he looks on stage. How he dresses on stage. Shit, some of those finale outfits had people practically  _ drooling,  _ and you call that bland?”

  
  


“Tall, blonde, white, polished, pageant queen,” Vixen responded succinctly, counting off each attribute on her fingers. “Tell me how that’s not part of the furniture in any part of the entertainment industry, Cracks. You could spit in the air at Miss Continental and nearly hit ten dudes like him. And you… you’ve always prided yourself on being different. On being weird. Comedy queens don’t usually go for the model girls. Especially when you’re both so…”

  
  


“So what?”

  
  


“So  _ different _ .”

  
  


“Do you really think he shouldn’t be going for me? Or do you just resent the bitch because of your known thing for his ex?”

  
  


For once, The Vixen was stunned into silence. Cracker had slid off his chair, turned and stalked out of the bar before a feeble ‘fuck you’ could even begin to escape his lips.

  
  


  1. _When Nina got concerned_



  
  


“What is this, an intervention for introverts?” Brooke joked as he walked into Nina’s hotel room with him, the older queen with a recognisably worried look on his face. Their gig had been over for hours, both were long out of drag, and now they were falling into their usual routine of a bitch fest before bed. Only this time, Brooke couldn’t help but feel as though Nina’s mama-bear routine was incoming, and began to steel himself in preparation for a talk about his  _ feelings. _

  
  


“No, darling, it’s not,” Nina replied with sympathy, sitting down in an armchair by the window after patting the one opposite, motioning for her friend to join her. “I do have some misgivings, though. Maybe you can help me figure it out.”

  
  


“About what?” 

  
  


“You and Cracker.”

  
  


Brooke sighed. He’d known this was coming. “Oh, here we go…” the Canadian queen cringed, reaching up to massage his temple, a literal headache forming at the same time as this figurative one. “There’s nothing to have misgivings about. We had… are having… had a thing for a while. It was fun. That’s all there is to it.” He felt his neck warm up at the look on Nina’s face, his old friend sitting there with staring eyes and brows raised unusually, sceptically high. Yep, blushing. He was definitely blushing.

  
  


“If it’s nothing, you wouldn’t be stumbling for words.. And… you know the last time I saw you look like that? Like you’d found somebody to spend time with who mattered - mattered enough to make you look like a schoolboy with a crush?”

  
  


_ Don’t say it, Nina. Don’t say it, don’t say it… _

  
  


“That would be Vanjie. And Brooke, I love you, you know that, but I’ve got to remind you how that turned out.’

  
  


Brooke winced, and Nina reached out to him, regretfully picking up a hand and squeezing.

  
  


“I don’t want to cause you any embarrassment, but for someone who projects and even dresses like a goddamn ice queen, when you fall, you fall hard. And with the speed this has all happened, yes, I’m concerned for you. I watched you take the heat when it all fell apart with Vanjie and I saw the pain you were in. It’s like the whole thing just  _ shattered  _ you, and I…” 

  
  


Brooke’s own eyes widened in horror as his best friend choked, his throat constricted and voice trembling. “If that happened to you again, I don’t know that I could handle seeing you hurt. Because you, you’d take it on the chin but wall it all up inside, letting yourself get so fucking lonely…”

  
  


With a sudden pang of anguish, Brooke got out of his chair, squished in beside Nina and threw his arms around the older man’s neck, hugging him tight. His chest felt both tight and full to burst at the same time, feeling both pains of guilt and full of appreciation for his friend’s love. “What did I fucking do to deserve you, Nina?” he chuckled softly, resting his head against Nina’s, resting there quietly while he rubbed comforting circles on his back, thumb twisting into the fabric of his shirt.

  
  


They both sat there for a while, doing nothing but hold each other and listening to the sound of each other’s breathing. It was true that each queen acted like the other’s support animal, an old joke, but one with an element of truth to be sure. However, while the two men sat quietly, Brooke’s brain began to run overtime, anxiety letting each passing through pull at his brain with increasing agony. Vanjie had alluded to it when they’d broken up, that one day, he was going to feel the way Vanjie did at another man’s hands, and his lack of prior relationships meant that the pain might break him. Cracker might dwell on his reputation, or be afraid of getting into something as serious as there’d been with his ex-fiancé and bolt. Worse, what if he, Brooke, panicked… again? What if he let someone get close to him, fall for him, and be let down by him… again? What if he was responsible for Cracker being broken by a man who screwed him over… again? Brooke wasn’t sure if he could cope knowing that he’d destroyed not one, but two people he cared about. Three, he supposed, if he counted the thought of disappointing Nina.

  
  


God, he was such a fuckup.

  
  


 

  * __When they realised it could actually turn out OK__



 

 

It seemed to Cracker, as he lay there in Brooke Lynn's arms, that neither one of them seemed to know how to escape the other. At his last count, they'd tried to break it off a whole five times - sometimes one, sometimes the other, sometimes both - and every time they'd found their way back to each other. It was almost as if they were a pair of magnets, drawn to each other so tightly that whenever they were separated, they ended up slamming right back towards each other, no choice but to deal with it, but the natural thing to do all the same.

  
  


He drew patterns on his lover's taut arm muscles as he slept, feather light touches to match his own spirit. Watching him lying there, peaceful in his slumber, was weirdly soothing - not that Cracker quite understood why. Still, there they were, the smaller queen reluctant to move - not just because of the risk of disturbing Brooke's rest, but because he too felt safe, strong arms keeping him held there.

  
  


He couldn't help but smile as he watched Brooke's eyes open slowly, the exhaustion writ large on his face as it tilted up to face him. 

  
  


"Hey," Brooke mumbled, his words muffled a little against Cracker's shoulder. "Did I fall asleep?"

  
  


"Yeah, you did," the other man replied fondly, kissing the top of his lover's head. "Can't say I blame you, though. You were being kept quite busy earlier…"

  
  


Brooke blushed a little, but grinned nonetheless. The memory of their afternoon together was definitely a happy one, full of laughter and mutual pleasure, ending up in a tangle of limbs under the covers. Their reunion, a good month and a half since they'd been at gigs anywhere near each other, had been more than needed. It was as if each was a human comfort blanket for the other, providing the security each other needed in their minds as well as their tired out bodies. Brooke himself had been surprised to feel this at first, but in a way, it made sense.  _ They _ made sense. There wasn’t any pressure between them to be romantic, exclusive or any kind of fantasy - and in the greatest sense of irony, that had only made the Canadian happier to be in the arms of the Seattle-born queen. 

  
  


It felt good to be understood. Understood was more important than anything to him. 

  
  


“You know something?” he asked, prompting Cracker’s brown eyes to gaze into his.

  
  


“Mmm?”

  
  


“I think we’re gonna be OK.”

  
  


Crackler chuckled, then made an affectionate sound in the back of his throat as Brooke looked confused by his response. “No, I mean, I’m glad you think so… but what brought this on?” he asked, reaching around the pillow to twirl a finger into his blond hair.

  
  


Brooke shuffled a little so he could look at his lover properly, watching each emotion as it flickered across his face. “I’ve just been thinking… honesty between people in our position, it has to be a good thing, right?”

  
  


“Right.”

  
  


“I feel like… it’s easy to be honest. Like, that you’re going to get it, and I don’t have anything to be sick with worry about in telling you what I want. And that… that makes me happy, because… because I’m not forcing anything. This is me, this is what I want, and…” another pause, as he slid a hand down the other man’s back. “...I’m all in. Promise.”

  
  


A smile, eyes that crinkled at the edge and the gentle touch of Cracker’s lips on his was all the response he needed.

 


End file.
